


dawning

by mercuryhatter



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Gen, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-06
Updated: 2013-03-06
Packaged: 2017-12-04 12:24:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/710748
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mercuryhatter/pseuds/mercuryhatter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They wake, screaming, quiet, desperate, laughing, and converge.</p>
            </blockquote>





	dawning

Jehan woke up screaming.  
  
There were words muffled in his scream, familiar words flowing over his tongue like blood, but the words and their meanings were strangled in his throat, incomprehensible. His hands, pen marks fading on their freckled backs, were fisted in the sheets, and his chest was exploding with pain, vivid and dreamlike all at once.  
  
He gasped himself free of the last fragments of the dream, hands flying out of the sheets to scrabble at his chest, stopping in surprise when they did not come away bloody. There was a faint roaring in his ears, an echo, but it was already passing into silence.  
  
Jehan turned his face into the pillow to muffle his sudden sobs, and it was several minutes before he could get out of bed.  
  
Bahorel and Feuilly had almost certainly heard him from their bedrooms to either side of his, but both were good enough not to say anything when Jehan appeared in the kitchen, much paler than usual, watering his windowbox plants with unsteady hands. Bahorel swept him up in a bleary good-morning hug, bigger and tighter than usual, and Feuilly squeezed his shoulder bracingly as he passed before presenting him with an omelet after a few minutes at the stove. When Jehan smiled, eyes full, and said, “you didn’t have to,” Feuilly just smiled back, pressed a friendly kiss to Jehan’s bedhead, and said, “I know.”  
  
—-  
  
Enjolras woke up quiet.  
  
The dream he’d had, confused and vague though it had been, left him contemplative and oddly silent. A hollow somewhere in his chest had opened— several, really, and he rubbed them, frowning, before rolling over to Grantaire, who was still sleeping soundly next to him.  
  
“Grantaire,” he said quietly, then shook the other man’s arm when he got no response. “ _Grantaire._ ”   
  
“Hm?” Grantaire stirred suddenly, glancing at Enjolras, who had rested his chin on Grantaire’s bare chest and was staring at him solemnly.   
  
“Do you…” Enjolras said slowly, then shook his head and reached for Grantaire’s hand in silence. Grantaire rubbed his thumb over the seeking hand soothingly, looking concerned.  
  
“What?” he asked. Enjolras only shook his head again, rolling off Grantaire and staring up at the ceiling.  
  
He did not let go of Grantaire’s hand.  
  
—-  
  
Joly woke up desperate.  
  
His medical history class had been giving him similar nightmares for weeks, but this one was worse, personal and familiar and real. He could still feel faltering pulses beneath his fingers, hands scrubbing frantically at the blood he thought he felt flecking his face.  
  
The drops were only tears, he found, but he couldn’t slow his ragged breathing, so he fumbled for his phone and nearly fainted in relief when a familiar deep voice answered him. Bossuet murmured patiently to him for a few minutes until Musichetta woke and leaned over to lend her warm-honey tones to the call. Joly fell asleep again to the mingled sounds of their voices, the phone mashed between his ear and the pillow, and this time when he dreamed it was of the three of them in a bed aligned perfectly with the magnetic poles.  
  
—-  
  
Courfeyrac woke laughing.  
  
He felt shot through with adrenaline, unable to stop running his fingers through his wavy russet hair, but most of all unable to stop laughing. Nothing was particularly funny; in fact, there was a deep ache near his heart, like homesickness, but more like missing someone. He laughed anyway— it seemed like the thing to do. Restless, he paced around the apartment, muffling his occasional giggles behind his hand and trying to be quiet, but Combeferre woke anyway, sticking his head out from his bedroom and raising an eyebrow to ask what on Earth was so funny. Courfeyrac found he couldn’t answer; instead, he just strode over to fling himself on Combeferre’s neck, one hand remaining on the back of the other man’s head even after the embrace was ended. Combeferre looked back at him with fond, tired eyes, and Courfeyrac thought he understood.  
  
—-  
  
Their convergence was inevitable; the sense of anticipation was with all of them, even if they didn’t understand why exactly their hearts were fluttering so. Courfeyrac was even more excitable and talkative than usual, following Combeferre around like a puppy with a constant stream of mostly one-sided conversation. For his part, Combeferre was jumpy, anxious, unable to shake the feeling that he’d forgotten something, or that he was about to be late, or that he’d not finished something properly. Courfeyrac’s presence helped, and so Combeferre didn’t mind when his phone went off constantly in his chemistry lab.   
  
Enjolras remained quiet and reserved and Grantaire remained concerned. He wasn’t displeased with the way Enjolras kept touching him, softly and lightly, as if he might disappear at any moment, but it worried him. Equally worrying was the way he kept looking around corners or over his shoulder or turning to his right (Grantaire always held his left hand) as if expecting someone to be there, and looking disappointed when the space was empty.  
  
“Are you looking for someone?” Grantaire finally asked, and Enjolras startled.  
  
“No,” he said, after a pause, sounding almost sad, and Grantaire let the subject drop.  
  
Joly alternated between almost aggressively tuning everything out, earphones in and nose in his textbook, and seeking out Bossuet and Musichetta with a freneticism that was over the top even for his usual. He’d touch their hands repeatedly until their eyes met in unspoken agreement over his head and they stayed near him while he studied, shoulders pressed lightly to each of his.  
  
Jehan was distracted, more so than usual, and fidgety, tugging on the cuffs of his yellow sweater until they started to fray. He’d dressed that morning with so little care that his bright yellow daisy sweater was paired with pants screen-printed to look like the ocean, and his shoes, painted for him by Feuilly, were mismatched— one patterned with dragonflies and the other with roses. He kept murmuring about moths and psychopomps, and Bahorel and Feuilly treated it like any of his bouts of melancholia, assuming he’d read something that had particularly distracted his mind— Bahorel brought him cupcakes from his pastry class, and Feuilly tucked a delicately folded paper hibiscus into the top of his braid. Jehan smiled at them and pressed light butterfly kisses to their faces, but he was waiting for something, and the waiting lent a shadow to his light eyes.  
  
It was a cafe that became the place of their meeting, because of course it was— it wasn’t  _that_ cafe, but it was close enough. Towards the end of the day Jehan’s face was brilliantly lit with a smile and he led Bahorel and Feuilly there with an insistent hand in each of theirs, talking airily about fate and chance but using so many extended metaphors that his friends weren’t even sure that he knew quite what he was saying. Courfeyrac bounded merrily with Combeferre in tow; Enjolras was tense with anticipation or fear or maybe hope, his hand tight in Grantaire’s as they walked; Joly brought Musichetta and Bossuet there with a stream of bright but mildly anxious chatter.  _Something_ was happening. No one quite knew what it was, but it was  _something_.  
  
Courfeyrac was the first to understand. His laugh rang through the cafe, so familiar even though the surfaces it bounced from were not the same ones that had held his laughter long ago, and swept Enjolras into a hug that took them both spinning while Grantaire looked on first in bewilderment, then in amazement. Courfeyrac released Enjolras at last and moved to Grantaire; in his wake, Combeferre and Enjolras were grasping hands, the air between them sparking with relief. Jehan cried out and sprang onto Joly, who stumbled back into Bossuet to keep from dropping the little poet, and Joly’s face lost its tension as it spread into a real smile for the first time that day. The embrace turned into a pile as Bossuet and Musichetta joined in. Enjolras and Combeferre turned to watch with matching fond smiles as Courfeyrac threw himself jubilantly into the fray, and over all their heads Enjolras and Musichetta exchanged warm nods.  
  
Bahorel strode over, clapping hands to shoudlers in a way that might very well bruise, although no one seemed to mind; Feuilly was more reticent, clasping hands first with Enjolras and them with Combeferre before managing to get himself tugged into another spinning Courfeyrac hug. Jehan bounded over next, crying openly now over his broad sunshine smile as he peppered Grantaire’s face with kisses; Grantaire pulled him close and hung on tightly before Combeferre stepped in with a polite smile and a light hand on Grantaire’s shoulder. Then suddenly he and Jehan were kissing full on the lips, mouths open and eyes shut, hands in hair and clinging fiercely to shoulders and hips.  
  
The moment of silence that followed was broken when Courfeyrac crowed out a triumphant “hah!” and started saying _told you so!_ to anyone who would listen— Bahorel was good-naturedly cursing and handing over a few bills, and Enjolras was hiding a smile. Grantaire hung close by his side, their hands brushing every few minutes, and his eyes were distant— everything was so immediate, so similar, he thought he could smell dust and wine in the air and it made him dizzy.   
  
Combeferre and Jehan separated, the former with a sheepish smile and the latter red all the way down to his shoulders, but still wearing a broad smile almost too big for his face.  
  
“Told you so,” Courfeyrac stage-whispered, one more time for good measure, and everyone laughed.  
  
They gravitated slowly towards tables in the back, not noticing and certainly not caring about the stares they were drawing from other customers. Enjolras and Combeferre were deep in conversation, with Courfeyrac draped over Enjolras’ shoulder even though he was talking loudly to Joly and Bossuet across their table. Jehan plopped himself on Musichetta’s lap, laughing, with delight scrawled all over his face, and Bahorel and Grantaire were trading insults about muscle tone and shoving each others’ shoulders. Enjolras pulled Feuilly into his and Combeferre’s conversation, smiling so widely that Grantaire kept finding his gaze drawn to the radiant expression without even realizing it, even as Jehan managed to get him started on a rant about Themis.  
  
It was all so very familiar that Jehan had to put a hand out to Feuilly, hanging onto his shoulder as an anchor. Joly caught Jehan’s eyes and nodded; he understood.  
  
“It’s not the same,” he murmured, leaning close to Jehan and smiling encouragingly. “Not this time.”  
  
Jehan nodded, feeling steadier as he smiled back at Joly— Joly, still in his green scrubs, wearing three scarves even though it was spring, with Bossuet’s leather jacket over his shoulders, and blinked away the images of laughing men in waistcoats. He moved off Musichetta’s lap and into Joly’s, who received him with a brilliant grin and a tug on the end of his braid, and relaxed, closing his eyes with a blissful smile on his face as he let the conversations around him wash over him.   
  
After a moment he leaned forward to slip a pen out of Feuilly’s pocket— he was always losing them and Bahorel was always breaking them, but Feuilly could always be counted on to have a spare— and scribbled lines about dawn and hope onto the corner of the table.


End file.
